1822, "Margherita d'Anjou"
for Milan; and in 1823, "L'Esule di Granata," also for Milan. These
works of the composer's 'prentice hand met with the usual fate of the
production of the thousand and one musicians who pour forth operas in
unremitting flow for the Italian theatres; but they were excellent drill
for the future author of "Robert le Diable" and "Les Huguenots." On
returning to Germany Meyerbeer was very sarcastically criticised on the
one side as a fugitive from the ranks of German music, on the other as
an imitator of Rossini.

Meyerbeer returned to Venice, and in 1824 brought out "Il Crociato
in Egitto" in that city, an opera which made the tour of Europe, and
established a reputation for the author as the coming rival of Rossini,
no one suspecting from what Meyerbeer had then accomplished that he
was about to strike boldly out in a new direction. "II Crociato" was
produced in Paris in 1825, and the same year in London. In the latter
city, Veluti, the last of the male sopranists, was one of the principal
singers in the opera; and it was said by some of the ill-natured critics
that curiosity to see and hear this singer of a peculiar kind, of whom
it was said, "Non vir sed Veluti," had as much to do with the success
of the opera as its merits. Lord Mount Edgcumbe, however, an excellent
critic, wrote of it "as quite of the new school, but not copied from
its founder, Rossini; original, odd, flighty, and it might be termed
fantastic, but at times beautiful. Here and there most delightful
melodies and harmonies occurred, but it was unequal, solos being as rare
as in all the modern operas." This was the last of Meyerbeer's operas
written in the Italian style. In 1827 the composer married, and for
several years lived a quiet, secluded life. The loss of his first two
children so saddened him as to concentrate his attention for a while
on church music. During this period he composed only a "Stabat," a
"Miserere," a "Te Deum," and eight of Klopstock's songs. But he was
preparing for that new departure on which his reputation as a great
composer now rests, and which called forth such bitter condemnation
on the one hand, such thunders of eulogy on the other. His old fellow
pupil, Weber, wrote of him in after-years: "He prostituted his profound,
admirable, and serious German talent for the applause of the crowd which
he ought to have despised." And Mendelssohn wrote to his father in words
of still more angry disgust: "Whe